Clone Wars Gambit: Siege by Karen Miller Page B

work.”
    “Work is work,” said Obi-Wan, smoothing his beard. “My cousin’s young but he knows how to sweat a full day. I’m not young but I work hard, too. We could learn damotite. Only—” He frowned. “When Markl and I left Lanteeb there were rumors about it.”
    “Not rumors. Truth.” Rikkard rubbed his scarred nose again. “Demand for damotite started disappearing three, four seasons ago. A lot of mines closed—but not ours. Torbel’s damotite is the best and what little need there is for it, we mostly supply. And now the government wants it, too, as much as we can pull out of the ground and make safe for transport. Every week they send a droid convoy from the city to take what we produce.”
    “A droid convoy?” said Anakin. “No regular men?”
    Rikkard shook his head. “It’s not safe for men to ride the shipment so far. For the government we take out only base impurities. Good as raw our damotite is, for them.”
    “Raw?” said Obi-Wan, pretending surprise. “There’s a use for it raw in the Confederacy?”
    “They don’t say why they want it and we don’t ask,” said Teeb Rikkard, brows lowered. “It’s the government. We send them damotite, they send us food and leave us alone to mine. To live. More, more, more. That’s all they say.”
    Anakin felt his belly heave, protesting the implications as well as Teeba Jaklin’s eggs.
More, more, more
meant Dooku and Durd planned to produce huge quantities of the bioweapon—and that meant the entire Republic was in danger. He imagined Padmé writhing and dying like Bant’ena’s lab rodent and came close a second time to losing what little breakfast he’d eaten.
    “You’ve never asked why they suddenly want so much?” He knew he sounded critical, accusing, but he couldn’t help it. Bad things happened because questions weren’t asked. Because people preferred to close their eyes and turn away. “You’ve never wondered what they’re going to do with—”
    Rikkard’s fist thumped the kitchen table. “I don’t care about that, Teeb Markl. This village was
dying
. No future. No hope. All we have is damotite. All we know is mining. But the Republic didn’t care about that. The Republic didn’t care about
us
. Every day Teeba Jaklin and me, we watched the children’s faces growing thinner and thinner and we knew we couldn’t help them. We couldn’t help ourselves. Almost nobody wanted our damotite anymore. We were facing the
end.
”
    “And then came word from Lantibba City,” said Teeba Jaklin. “From the government. They offered to help us. Food for damotite. We said yes.”
    Teeb Rikkard was still frowning. “This is how we live now, in Torbel. Almost every hour mining and cleaning damotite. The government says when it has money again we’ll have money. Until then we have food. I won’t take food from a hungry child’s mouth. If you’re the kind of man who could do that, Teeb Markl, then Torbel is not the village for you. You and your cousin can find another—”
    “No, no,” said Obi-Wan hastily. “Teeb Rikkard, you mustn’t have a care for Markl. His tongue rattles. Of course you’re mining the damotite. Your people must eat. We have no quarrel with that. We have no quarrel with you.” He turned. “For shame, cousin, when these good people gave us shelter.”
    Blinking, Anakin stared at him. “I’m sorry, Yavid, I—”
    Obi-Wan cuffed the back of his head. “Don’t apologize to me, Markl. Apologize to the Teeb and Teeba and then hope we are still welcome in Torbel.”
    Anakin dropped his gaze to the table. “I’m very sorry. I was wrong. Please don’t send us away.”
    “Rikkard—” Teeba Jaklin took a light hold of the man’s arm. “Let them stay. Let them earn their keep. Bohle’s sick and Dahm’s overgreen, remember, and Brinnie with his wrenched ankle’s no use, either. We’re behind in the mining and the convoy’s only three days away. The government won’t be pleased if the delivery